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[poppycock]

Online handle: Crystal
Age: 30
Preferred contact: provenance

Character name: Klaus Mikaelson
Canon and canon point: The Originals, 5.1, “Where You Left Your Heart”
History: »»
Personality:

The world was harsh and unfair to Klaus Mikaelson from the beginning and so he became both harsh and unfair to not only survive it, but to conquer it. As a child of abuse, he chases a constant need to be the most powerful, for only then might he feel safe and be able to demand the unconditional love denied him. As a monster living in a supernatural world for over a thousand years of bloodshed and war, he likewise prescribes to the belief that only the most powerful may live with any semblance of security; the most powerful can and should take that security and at the detriment and terrorization of others. This is how Klaus answered his parents’, Mikael and Esther, abuse: by becoming like them. By ensuring the world feared him and with that fear, he protected his family. This has shaped him into the person and the monster he's become: impulsive, narcissistic, and ruthless. As his sister Rebekah puts it, they are broken, damaged things: always and forever cursed to live without hope. But they didn't get to that point through Mikael's terrorism alone. Much of his siblings’ anguish and pain has been committed by Klaus himself.

Klaus’ insecurities are deep and often blinding, serving as a catalyst to his violent and cruel behaviors. His traumas are rooted in his belief and his fear of being worthless, unloved, and abandoned by those he holds dear. He accuses and lashes out at others for what he perceives as their disloyalty, whether they truly are or not. He eschews responsibility for his own actions and blames others for the course of his life, and for his anguish. He is the judge, jury, and executioner, and often times his mercy is just as cruel as his condemnation, as when he exiled his sister from their home instead of incapacitating her.

But his insecurities are also proof of his humanity. Klaus loves his siblings and they love him. Though he uses his desire to protect and provide for them as an excuse for his terrorization, they are the only family he has, and the only people who truly mean anything to him. Klaus has never once left Rebekah, and Elijah refuses to leave him. When it comes down to it, the Mikaelsons stick together as one, always and forever. An enemy to one of them is an enemy to all of them, no matter past betrayals or deeds. Though Klaus may have treated them poorly (understatement of ten centuries) there is real, deep, abiding love and affection between them all.

Since the conception of his daughter, Klaus has something to fight for that is not himself; someone to fight for whom he feels complete allegiance and love without doubts or paranoia. Hope is (and yes, Klaus is as subtle as an anvil) his hope: for family, for acceptance, and for some semblance of a happy life. Hope is, as Elijah has put it, their family’s hope; she has united the Mikaelsons and her mother, Hayley, in a way nothing else has, arguably since they were first vampires. She is the home Klaus has always longed to create. Because at heart, through all of Klaus' scheming and cruelty, is still the caring boy who loves his family more than anything else, who merely wants to belong somewhere and be loved. Above it all, Klaus wants to create a home. And despite his selfishness and paranoia; despite his predilection to violence as the answer, he can be loving and empathetic. He wants those he cares about to be happy. Many a time he has simply let fear rule him instead of love.

The trials he has experienced throughout The Originals have changed Klaus from that cruel, abusive monster to someone who values that love and family over his own selfish fears. He has learned to acknowledge, accept, and value his own sentimentality, love, and concern for others in ways he previously renounced as weakness. (He has told Elijah, “We do not feel, and we do not care.” Centuries later, he told his brother Kol, “Family is power.”) In many ways this development has been spurred by fatherhood, but also by the friends and family that have become important to him over the past few years: notably Freya, his lost older sister; Camille, his therapist and woman of his affection; and Hayley, the mother of his child and someone he has grown to trust as a partner for their daughter.

Klaus’ self-awareness has become more pronounced. He has experienced great loss and has faced the consequences of his family’s constant brutality. The safety of his siblings has been fatally threatened by a prophecy of their destruction and as a consequence, Klaus has faced his first sireling, his first love, his first enemies; he has lost his connection to his sireline, his greatest friend, and his surrogate son. The thousand years of tyranny and destruction the Mikaelsons and Klaus has wrought has never been more apparent, nor how “Always and forever” has doomed not only them to lives of misery, but those around them. Such loss and introspection has led Klaus to begin to demonstrate value in his relationships in ways he has not before: choosing to save those he would have (and has) condemned for the sake of others, electing to hold onto his broken relationships to heal them rather than force allegiance, and to learn forgiveness and admit his wrongs.

These experiences have altered Klaus, but not entirely. As he has for ten centuries, he is willing to do anything for his family. He struggles still with his own self-worth, with his blind reliance on cruelty and force, and with his ability to be a good father. He is simply willing to sacrifice now what he was never willing to sacrifice before: himself.

What are they in for? Murder, a lot of murder, an excessive amount of murder even for an immortal, exuberant maiming, joyful torturing, and quite a few bad puns.
Pick a number from 1-99: 15
Inventory:

his phone, with all the usual accoutrements